Tuesday, November 21, 2017

Interest in the ketogenic diet has exploded over the last few years thanks to ground breaking research and coverage from popular fitness figures such as Dominic D'Agostino. While studies have consistently confirmed the benefits of achieving ketosis via the ketogenic diet, many followers find it difficult to stay consistent with the diet. If you’re looking to achieve a rapid state of ketosis and reap the benefits without worrying about your meals, the solution may be as simple as taking a sip.

What is the Ketogenic Diet?

The ketogenic diet focuses on replacing carbohydrate consumption with healthy fats. Where a normal diet only has 15% to 25% of daily caloric intake coming from fat, the ketogenic diet has between 60% to 80% from healthy fat sources.

The idea behind the diet is to limit carbohydrate intake so that your body switches over to producing and using ketones. Ketone bodies are produced by the liver from fat sources, both stored or ingested. The body will switch over to using ketones when carbohydrate intake is limited and caloric consumption is low overall. When ketones are used as the primary fuel source in the body, you have achieved a state of ketosis.

Why is the Ketogenic So Popular?

The ketogenic diet has become so immensely popular due to the benefits that have become associated with it. Both athletes and everyday fitness enthusiasts can experience significant benefits from the ketogenic diet.

Increase in Fat Burning

Arguably the benefit that pushed the ketogenic diet into the spotlight, studies have shown and users have confirmed that entering a ketogenic state dramatically improves fat burning and insulin sensitivity. What’s more, the ketogenic diet isn’t a fad diet. Studies have demonstrated how the ketogenic diet is ideal for long term weight management.

Insulin Resistance and Diabetes

Continuing with the idea above, insulin resistance has become one of the most prevalent and preventable conditions in the United States. This is primarily due to poor dietary choices of excessive carbohydrate intake. Studies show that by following a ketogenic diet, subjects were able to improve their insulin sensitivity. This has dramatic implications as a natural solution for those suffering from diabetes.

Athletes and Weight Cutting

For athletes who have to make weight in order to compete, the ketogenic diet may be an effective and safe way to get lean. Most athletes will subject themselves to extreme diets and excessive sauna bathing. Entering ketosis helps shed excess weight while preserving muscle glycogen for performance.

Cognitive Boost

Brain hackers everywhere went wild when they found out that the ketogenic diet had the potential to improve overall cognitive functioning. Experts suggest that your brain actually prefers ketones, in particular, beta-Hydroxybutyrate, or BHB, as an energy source. On top of this, entering ketosis has been suggested to halt brain aging.

The Problem with the Ketogenic Diet

There’s no doubt that the ketogenic is amazing but everything has to have a catch, right?

The biggest complaint about the ketogenic diet from followers is the idea that they have to cut down on carbohydrates and increase their healthy fat intake. If they are able to adjust to a ketogenic meal planner, the next hurdle is entering a ketogenic state. If you don’t do your research on the ketogenic diet, you’ll most likely run into what is known as the keto flu.

As you cut down on carbohydrates, your body may not be happy with that decision. Without the proper meal planner that emphasizes healthy fats and electrolytes, your body may experience symptoms such as nausea, drowsiness, and mood swings. This is the reaction to the new diet as your body adjusts. Doesn’t sound pleasant, does it?

While the keto flu is completely preventable by slowly eliminating carbohydrates from the diet, focusing on healthy fats, and keeping yourself packed with electrolytes, one question still comes to mind:

“Is there an easier way to achieve ketosis?”

The answer is, “of course!” Introducing KetoneAid.

What is KetoneAid?

KetoneAid is a powerful, American-made exogenous ketones drink that puts you into an instant state ketosis!

Remember the preferred energy source I mentioned above? KetoneAid is a powerful ketone ester made up of D-beta-hydroxybutyrate and R 1,3-butanediol. Each bottle contains 30 grams, or one serving, of the ketone ester.

Highlights of KetoneAid

KetoneAid is made in the United States – It is safe and free from cross contaminants (unlike other ketone supplements made in China)

Allows you to achieve very high ketone levels without the excessive salt load (up to 6.0mMol)

Mimics a 5-day fast in 15 Minutes!

No need to be currently following the ketogenic diet

Affordable: Price dropped from $1,000 per gram to under $1 per gram

What sets KetoneAid apart from other ketone body supplements is results, taste, and salt.

No Salt Load with KetoneAid

There are ketone supplements out there that contain high levels of sodium and this may cause unwanted bloating. If you have prior medical issues with hypertension or water retention, you can see how this would be a problem. KetoneAid allows you to enter a ketogenic state without the worry of too much salt.

Taste of KetoneAid

Let’s talk taste. Some of the original ketone body esters have been compared to rocket fuel. A funny conversation between Peter Attia and Tim Ferriss captures Peter’s first experience with one of the original ketone ester drinks that almost made him vomit!

KetoneAid is the first palatable exogenous ketones drink out there, allowing you to enjoy the benefits of ketosis without choking down something that tastes like gasoline.

Benefits of KetoneAid

Benefits of KetoneAid

When it comes to the results of KetoneAid, let’s break it down into two categories: scientific evidence of the benefits of exogenous ketones and unpaid, unbiased user reviews. First, what does science say about ketone esters?

Cognitive Benefits

The science behind ketone esters is positive overall and the results of these studies continue to gain support for future research. When it comes to the brain, ketone esters have been shown to promote cognitive function, specifically working memory enhancement. One study published in Neurobiology of Aging showed that adults who had been diagnosed with cognitive impairment showed significant improvement after supplementing with coconut oil to boost their ketone levels.

What’s more, studies also suggest that ketone esters may be an effective way to alleviate symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease while promoting the health of the brain.

Performance and Endurance

For decades, athletes relied on carbohydrates as their primary fuel source. That may all be changing soon enough as studies are revealing that ketone esters can act as a more effective fuel source for both muscle and brain tissue. In particular, endurance-focused subjects demonstrated improved performance times. It goes without saying then that the implications for marathon runners, boxers, or any endurance-based athlete are huge.

Weight Loss and Cardiovascular Health

The prevalence of ketone esters in the body has been shown to promote fat burning and subsequently weight loss. This is important for cardiovascular health as overweight and obese individuals are more likely to develop cardiovascular issues and disease.

Ketone Esters as Antioxidants

One interesting discovery about ketone esters, specifically D-beta-hydroxybutyrate, is their ability to destroy free radicals. Free radicals are responsible for promoting many age and stress-related complications including certain cancers. Ketone esters have been shown to eliminate free radicals, making it an important asset for protecting cardiovascular and cognitive health.

What are Users Saying About KetoneAid?

Now that we know what the science has been saying about ketone esters, the very thing inside of KetoneAid, what about those people who have tried it?

From marathon runners to racecar drivers to self-proclaimed brain hackers, professionals from all walks of life have tried and loved KetoneAid. There are dozens of video reviews on KetoneAid all reporting similar benefits.

Want to get an idea of the results of KetoneAid from the biggest names in the industry? Here are my favorite KetoneAid reviews from names you’ll be familiar with:

If you’re looking for the quick notes version, here’s a list of the most common user-reported benefits that you’ll find across each video and blog out there:

Cognitive

Mental clarity

Focus

Creativity

Weight Loss

Appetite suppression

Anti-inflammatory response

Exercise & Sports Performance

Calm energy

Recovery between reps when weightlifting

Less soreness

Improved exercise recovery time

Helps achieve new personal bests

Who Should Use KetoneAid?

In short, everyone should be using KetoneAid!

Whether you’re an active professional athlete, an average fitness enthusiast, or someone who is just looking to jump into a healthier lifestyle, KetoneAid can be a powerful tool to use to achieve those goals.

My Experience with KetoneAid

Let’s jump into what happened when I took KetoneAid. I’m going to describe my exact methods and how I felt during and after drinking KetoneAid.

I woke up at 6:00 a.m. and began my day with my usual four-hour fast. At 9:55 a.m., I measured my ketone body levels, which were 0.3 milligrams of ketones per millimoler of blood (mml).

At 10:00 a.m., I drank the one serving size (30 grams) of KetoneAid. Here are my ketone body readouts:

At 10:20 a.m., I measured my levels again and discovered they spiked to 4.8 mml.

At 10:40 a.m., my ketone body levels were 3.8 mml.

At 11:00 a.m., my ketone body levels were 3.3 mml.

At 11:30 a.m., my ketone body levels were 2.2 mml.

How Did I Feel After Drinking KetoneAid?

In short, I felt like a Zen monk on it. I couldn’t believe how spatially aware and conscious of my environment I was. Within the hour that I drank KetoneAid, I felt a calm energy. I was ready to jump into my workout but not in the same way that a caffeine-loaded pre-workout makes you feel. I could conquer the workout without the grunting, aggressiveness, and intensity that you get from other supplements.

My movements were more agile. A little bit of effort resulted in a lot of output. In other words, I didn’t have to do much to move further than expected.

As a professional personal trainer who is always in the gym, one of the best things I noticed about KetoneAid was how loose and limber I felt. There was a clear difference between how inflamed my joints and connective tissue usually feel compared to how they felt after drinking KetoneAid. In short, they felt much better.

I’ve been on the ketogenic diet before and being familiar with those benefits, I can safely say that KetoneAid is able to mimic a peaked state of ketosis in minutes, not days.

Would I Recommend KetoneAid?

Absolutely. I believe that KetoneAid can be an excellent support for both long term ketogenic diet followers and those who want the benefits of the keto diet without having to go through the adjustment stage.

As I mentioned above, KetoneAid can be a great tool for a variety of populations from professional athletes to those who are concerned about overall wellness and not personal bests in the gym.

7. Newport MT, VanItallie TB, Kashiwaya Y, King MT, Veech RL. A new way to produce hyperketonemia: use of ketone ester in a case of Alzheimer’s. Alzheimer’s & dementia: the journal of the Alzheimer’s Association. 2015;11(1):99-103. doi:10.1016/j.jalz.2014.01.006.

Wednesday, November 1, 2017

When we are babies, the only thing we want to do is learn to stand up and walk around so that we can more easily obtain food or bright and shiny objects. It’s something we don’t think about as adults. Going from crawling to standing to walking to running. We think it’s a natural progression that has always happened but is that necessarily true?

Homo erectus, or the upright man, was not always so. Researchers believe that there was a time when man once crawled, similar to a bear or wolf and that our skeletal structure is still evolving to meet our ever-changing movement patterns. The perfect example is the lower back pain and weak musculature that results from so many people performing computer-related tasks at their office day jobs.

Is there something that we’ve left behind in our crawling stages? New research is suggesting that we may need to take a step back if we want to see real health and fitness benefits. Let’s take a look at the history of crawling and why you may want to start doing it to improve your fitness results and overall wellness.

What is Crawling?

Aside from rolling back and forth, crawling is technically the first real movement pattern that we perform as humans. Most importantly, crawling is a developmental form of movement. This word shouldn’t be taken lightly as everything starts with crawling. When we are babies, we crawl. It’s cute and funny but there’s so much more going on behind the scenes.

When babies start crawling, they begin developing their neuromuscular connections, building strength in their muscles and connective tissue, and learning movement patterns. Crawling requires that the entire body starts to work together to move you forward, backward, and side to side. In other words, crawling is the foundation for all of the other movement patterns we learn as humans. Standing, walking, and running begin with crawling.

The Science of Crawling

There may be some of you out there that skipped the crawling stage or your own child was promoted to walking before they could crawl. Currently, there is a debate going on in the medical community as to whether crawling is a necessary developmental stage. Most experts are leaning towards the Yes camp. There are a number of reasons behind this.

Aside from what we talked about above with crawling being important for physical development, it is also essential for brain development as well. Doesn’t seem to make sense, does it? Well, here’s what it comes down to:

In our brains, we have a left and a right hemisphere. When we are babies, we have a lot of room for development. In fact, there are critical developmental stages that we should pass through if we want to develop healthy minds and bodies.

Crawling helps both hemispheres communicate and work together since the left side of the brain has to move the right side of the body and vice versa. Not only does crawling boost brain development but it’s also where we begin to learn hand and eye coordination. When you’re an adult, you take for granted that there was a time when you had no idea how to move, let alone run!

Aside from improving and building hemisphere communication, crawling will also allow a baby to learn speed and depth. They’ll develop the ability to understand a begin point and a destination point. Best of all, that smile on their face as they crawl is a tell-tale sign that they are building self confidence in their ability to move.

All this is great for babies but what about adults? Can crawling have the same, if not better, benefits for adults?

Adults and Crawling

Can crawling be beneficial as an adult? After years of walking, jogging, and running in an upright stance, can adding a few crawling movements to your workout program be beneficial? The answer is an absolute “yes!”

Admittedly, you won’t have to put on a diaper and crawl on your hands and knees. You’ll be taking more of an animalistic style approach to crawling but the benefits are numerous.

Muscle Development

Crawling is the original full body workout. When you engage in crawling, you are utilizing all of the major muscle groups. Your core is kept tight as your legs and glutes push you forward. Your chest, back, shoulders, and arms guide you through the range of motion. It won’t take long in a crawling position before you feel all of these muscles start to light up, signaling to you that they are working hard.

Balance and Coordination

Believe it or not, babies aren’t the only ones who can improve their balance and coordination through crawling. We all have something called a vestibular system that is responsible for taking in sensory information and adjusting our bodies accordingly to meet the demand of that sensory input. It’s how we know where to go without over doing it or falling short. For example, if someone throws a ball to you but you can see that’s it’s going a bit over your head, your vestibular system will take in this data and allow your body to move accordingly to be at the right point to catch that ball. Crawling can improve the vestibular system of humans from the time we’re babies until well into old age.

Nerves and Movement

There is an extremely important nerve called the Vagus Nerve that is present in the top of the head and runs down the spine through the throat and into the abdomen. What makes this nerve so important is the fact that it has such an extensive reach throughout the body. In other words, it’s essential for basic bodily function, especially those functions that we never think about. For example, the Vagus Nerve is responsible for supporting a consistent heart rate and, more importantly, it helps you breathe! Crawling is an excellent way to support and strengthen the Vagus Nerve, thereby, improving all of the functions that it’s responsible for.

Neural Function

For babies, crawling gets the brain and body moving. The first few times a baby crawls, the brain is firing to build synapses, understand sensory information, and improve upon all cognitive processes. While an adult’s sensory input understanding is already fully formed, we can all use a boost in our neural connections. Crawling may be beneficial in improving the health of our current neural connections while supporting the creation of new cells.

Memory

Continuing with the idea above, crawling may also be able to improve your working memory. Crawling demands a lot from your body. It requires that all of your muscles work together to perform the movement. This is pretty obvious. What may not be as obvious is the fact that crawling is a form of proprioceptive exercise. In other words, you need balance, coordination, and proper length-tension relationships between muscles. A recent study concluded that those exercises with a proprioceptive demand improved overall working memory.

Mood

This one shouldn’t be a surprise as numerous studies have confirmed that consistent exercise and physical activity is a natural and effective way to boost your mood. When you perform exercises, like crawling, your body releases those feel good chemicals such as serotonin. Scientists still haven’t confirmed the connection between exercise and the release of these chemicals but who needs the reason when the benefit is clear?

Top 4 Crawls You Need to Do

Now that you’re convinced about the benefits of crawling, I want to introduce you to four of my favorite crawling exercises that I use in my personal workout program. These crawls will build serious strength and coordination while reducing common aches and pains.

Lateral Crawl

Let’s begin with the easiest of the four movements: The Lateral Crawl is simple but that doesn’t mean it isn’t challenging. This movement demands that you move across the floor while switching hand and feet positions. We take for granted the learning curve for new exercises and this is a beginner’s movement that is sure to trigger those neural connections. Perform this first, see how you feel and if you are able to complete it with perfect form, I’d suggest moving on to the next movement.

Spiderman Pushup Crawl

The Spiderman Push-up Crawl combines a forward crawl with a push-up and the hip flexor-focused forward leg extension. While all muscles are required to pitch in, like the Lateral Crawl, this movement couldn’t be any more different. If this one is a challenge for you, I’d recommend sticking with it until it feels comfortable. Once you can confidently perform both the Lateral Crawl and the Spiderman Push-up Crawl, then I’d say you’re ready for the next one.

Cross Crawls with Kettlebell

The first thing you’ll notice is that the Cross Crawls with Kettlebell isn’t what you’d consider a crawl. While you aren’t on your hands and knees, your muscles are still mimicking a crawl-like movement. The twisting and turning that you’ll be performing with this exercise is going to demand a lot from your core so I’d recommend perfecting your form without weight first then upgrade to a kettlebell when you feel comfortable doing so. Have you mastered all three movements? If so, it’s time to graduate to the advanced class with our final exercise.

Weighted Bear Pushup Crawls

If you have ever performed a push-up row, then you’ll be familiar with Weighted Bear Push-up Crawls. The idea here is to move a set of dumbbells, one weight at a time, while hopping your feet forward. The catch is that you can’t bend the knees. Once you’ve graduated from the previous three movements, give this one a try. Start with a small amount of weight and upgrade gradually as you become more confident with the exercise.

Conclusion

Have you tried crawling before? What benefits did you notice? Are you just starting out with the exercises I’ve recommended above? What questions or comments do you have for me? Let me know in the comments below!